Party in Peking

by Margaret Pemberton

  ‘They can be helped,’ Olivia said vehemently, leaning across the table towards him, her gentian-blue eyes brilliant. ‘There are enough Europeans in the city to form a rescue party!’

  Madame Lejeune, Madame Pichon and Mrs McCloud gasped at her effrontery. Monsieur Lejeune observed her high, rounded breasts as they pressed tightly against the silk of her bodice and tried to remember when he had last seen a more spirited and fiery creature. Mr McCloud listened to her with interest, impressed by the certainty in her voice. Phillippe regarded her with horror. Since the Minister had returned to the room she had subjected him to a virtual interrogation. Now she was behaving like a madwoman. She would never be invited to the embassy again. With every word that she uttered, she was ruining his career.

  ‘Olivia! Restrain yourself!’ he said angrily, his hand shooting and grasping hers. She shook it away without even deigning to look at him.

  ‘It is not possible,’ Monsieur Pichon was saying. ‘ The countryside is rife with Boxers. No small party could survive.’

  ‘They could!’ Olivia insisted passionately. ‘ Doctor Sinclair left the city two days ago accompanied by Doctor Morrison of The Times. Together they brought back to the city over forty missionaries and children!’

  Phillippe had already risen to his feet, his face flushed, his lips tight. ‘ If you will excuse me,’ he was saying to the wide-eyed guests, ‘my fiancée has recently undergone a most horrendous ordeal at the hands of the Boxers. She is not quite recovered. She is emotionally distressed and…’

  He walked quickly to her side and tried to lead her from the room.

  ‘Let go of me, Phillippe,’ she said her eyes sparkling dangerously. ‘I am not emotionally distressed. Not in the sense that you are implying. I am simply trying to convince the Minister that relief parties can be sent into the countryside! That now, right at this very moment, they are being sent!’

  ‘Olivia!’ Phillippe seized her arm, his voice ugly.

  Both Olivia and the Minister ignored him.

  ‘I heard about the Sinclair party,’ Monsieur Pichon said, the dinner and his other guests forgotten. ‘A very brave young man. It was Doctor Sinclair, I believe, who escorted yourself and your aunt and uncle and Lady Glencarty to safety?’

  ‘Yes, and a nun, Sister Angelique, and a Chinese girl and three children.’ Her eyes burned fiercely into his. ‘Monsieur Pichon, the Chinese converts struggling to reach the city are our responsibility. It is we who converted them to Christianity. We cannot allow them to be slaughtered for their faith, without lifting even a finger to help them.’

  Phillippe’s fingers dug cruelly into her arm and his Minister said sharply, ‘ Laissez! Ecoutez!’

  Phillippe obeyed, knowing that he would never forgive her for the humiliation of the evening; for the dashing of all his hopes.

  ‘Large numbers of troops must be sent for,’ Olivia continued, aware that she now had the attention not only of the Minister but of the entire table. ‘Very soon it will be too late. Peking will be cut off from all outside help.’

  ‘But surely Peking is not in danger?’ Mrs McCloud said waveringly. ‘The Boxers would never dare to attack the city.’

  Olivia turned to her briefly. ‘They would, Mrs McCloud. That is their avowed intention. Bishop Favier says that already there are many Boxers inside the city only waiting for the signal to be given to don their red sashes and to rise against Chinese Christians and Europeans.’

  ‘And who is Bishop Favier?’ Mrs McCloud asked, her face white.

  ‘The Vicar-Apostolic of Peking. His cathedral, the Peitang, stands in the west part of the Imperial City and is already crammed to the doors with refugees.’ She turned her attention once more to the intently listening Minister. ‘He is caring for hundreds of hungry and sick Chinese, aided only by the Sisters. He says he has tried time and time again to awaken the Corps Diplomatique to the severity of the situation. It is just as bad at the English Mission. There is barely room to breathe. They need organized help. Food and medicine.’

  ‘How can you be so sure of the situation in the west of the city, Miss Harland?’ the Minister asked, intrigued.

  ‘Because I have been there,’ Olivia said crisply. ‘ I have seen for myself.’

  Monsieur Pichon nodded slightly. Yes, she would have. She was a most extraordinary young woman.

  ‘I congratulate you, Phillippe, on your choice of a fiancée,’ he said to his white-faced and furious subordinate. ‘ She is both brave and intelligent.’ He clasped his hands beneath his chin, speaking to her as if they were alone in the room. As if she were his equal and a man.

  ‘I, alone of all my colleagues, have shared your fears from the very first. At a meeting of the Corps Diplomatique four days prior to the party given by Sir Claude in honour of your Queen’s eightieth birthday, I advocated that a naval detachment be sent for from Tientsin.’

  Olivia remembered Lady Glencarty’s spirited wish that his suggestion be vetoed.

  ‘Today, after the attack on Fengtai, we again met in council and it was decided unanimously that guards must be sent for. If all goes well, they should be leaving Tientsin for Peking in two days’ time.’

  Two days. Olivia’s relief was short-lived. The Corps Diplomatique had left it too late. In two days’ time the Boxers could very well be at the city’s gates.

  ‘When you say guards, will they be soldiers or sailors and how many will there be?’

  Monsieur Pichon’s eyes gleamed. The enchanting Miss Harland should have been born a boy. She would have made a splendid asset at any conference table.

  ‘Sailors and marines, Miss Harland. There are several warships lying off the coast at Taku. From Taku the railway runs the thirty miles inland to Tientsin and then continues the sixty-eight miles to Peking.’ He paused and then added, ‘The first detachment is, I fear, dangerously small in number.’

  ‘How small?’ Olivia asked.

  The eyes of everyone in the room flicked from Olivia’s head of soft, dark hair with the gardenia nestling in its depths, to the Minister’s head, grey and bowed.

  ‘Three hundred officers and men,’ he said at last.

  Mr McCloud now fully convinced of the danger in which they stood, paled. ‘ Three hundred?’ he whispered. ‘Against Boxers?’

  The Minister nodded unhappily.

  Olivia’s face was grave. ‘The railway terminus for Peking is outside the city walls,’ she said slowly. ‘It will be very easy for them to be trapped and killed even before they reach the gates of the city.’

  No one spoke. Maids cleared the untouched plates of dessert away and Olivia realized, for the first time, that she had the attention, not only of the Minister, but of every other person in the room.

  ‘What do you suggest, Miss Harland?’ the Minister asked, and there was no mockery or condescension in his voice. It was a simple question, simply asked.

  ‘That more troops be sent for before the railway link with Tientsin is broken and that relief parties be organized immediately and sent to Ch’anghsintien. The construction workers have their families with them. There will be women and children there, unprotected against Boxer attack.’

  The Minister shook his head. ‘Ch’anghsintien is too far,’ he said, his eyes bleak. ‘For the Belgians, nothing can be done.’

  ‘I believe it can,’ she said, her cheeks flushed, the set of her chin wilful. ‘Will you form part of a rescue party, Mr McCloud?’

  Mr McCloud felt his face staining an ugly, embarrassed red. He shook his head. ‘No, I cannot ride very well. I would be a handicap to any rescue party.’

  Olivia’s eyes flicked contemptuously away from him and towards Monsieur Lejeune. ‘And you, Monsieur Lejeune?’ she asked. ‘Do you not ride very well either?’

  Monsieur Lejeune lowered his eyes and shook his head. ‘ No,’ he said, his voice muffled. ‘ I am sorry, Miss Harland, but such a project would be suicide.’

  Briefly her eyes met Phillippe’s. ‘And you, Phillippe?’

&nb
sp; ‘Of course not,’ he said without hesitation. ‘The very idea is lunacy.’

  ‘Very well.’ She turned once more to the Minister. ‘Monsieur Pichon, would you call a sedan chair for me, please?’

  ‘Our carriage is outside and waiting,’ Phillippe said brusquely.

  She stood for a second, her head high, the light from the chandeliers casting a nimbus of gold around the silky darkness of her hair. ‘I shall not be riding in it,’ she said, the tilt of her head emphasizing the long, lovely line of her throat.

  ‘But where are you going, Miss Harland?’ Monsieur Pichon asked in consternation.

  Olivia smiled at him, a dazzling, defiant smile that took his breath away. ‘To Ch’anghsintien,’ she said, and spun on a satin heel, leaving the Minister and his guests staring after her in open-mouthed disbelief.

  Chapter Seven

  The night air was hot and humid. With her heart beating fast and light, she ran across to where the McClouds’ and Lejeunes’ sedan chairs were waiting. She had only seconds to form a plan; to think. She could not go to Ch’anghsintien unescorted. She needed companions. Assistance. Bishop Favier could not leave his cathedral. Her uncle, even if he had been willing, was too old and infirm. She had no idea where Lewis was, and no means of contacting him.

  The sedan bearers were waiting for directions. ‘The Hôtel de Pekin,’ she said impulsively, sitting back and letting the curtain fall. She had promised her uncle that she would not leave the house unescorted until Phillippe had called for her. She had kept her promise. Now her duty was to herself, and to the Belgians trapped in Ch’anghsintien.

  Her bearers trotted swiftly through the straight, dark streets. Monsieur Chamot, the proprietor of the hotel had ridden with Lewis to bring the missionaries to safety. When he heard of the plight of the Belgian engineers and their families, he would surely accompany her with spare ponies. Her mind raced furiously. How many ponies would they need? How many people would be trapped in Ch’anghsintien?

  The sedan chair rocked and swayed and finally halted outside the golden lantern-lit façade of the Hôtel de Pekin. Picking up her skirts, Olivia ran to the door, beating on it with her fists.

  The clean-shaven gentleman who opened it displayed remarkable aplomb at confronting an unescorted young woman, her cheeks flushed, her eyes bright.

  ‘Monsier Chamot, I must speak to you!’ Olivia said urgently. ‘The railway line at Fengtai has been attacked and the Belgian engineers and their families are trapped at Ch’anghsintien!’

  Dr George Morrison’s eyes sharpened. ‘You had better come in, Miss…’

  ‘Harland,’ Olivia said, stepping past him and into the spacious hall. ‘Miss Olivia Harland.’

  George Morrison’s brows rose slightly. So this was the young lady that Lewis had escorted into the city. When Madame Chamot had asked for a description of her, Lewis had said merely that she was brave and intelligent, but there had been something in the tone of his voice that had attracted the journalist’s attention. He had wondered then if Miss Harland had possessed other qualities. Now he wondered no longer. The beauty in her oval face was bone deep and there was sensitivity as well as purity in the delicate lines of her cheekbones and jaw. He was not surprised that she had made such a deep impression on his friend.

  ‘The French Minister thinks it impossible to send out a rescue party for them. I thought that perhaps you would help me…’

  ‘Help you?’ Dr Morrison asked queryingly.

  ‘To ride to Ch’anghsintien with spare ponies,’ Olivia said succinctly.

  George Morrison regarded the determined tilt of her chin and reflected that Lewis Sinclair had not been wrong about her courage.

  ‘Please, Monsieur Chamot. There is no time to be lost.’

  George Morrison reached for his jacket. ‘First of all, Miss Harland, I am not Monsieur Chamot. He is not here at present. Both he and his wife have already set off to Ch’anghsintien. We received the news a little over an hour ago. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Doctor George Ernest Morrison. Peking correspondent for The Times.’

  Olivia swayed slightly. Of course. She had seen him before at one of Sir Claude MacDonald’s soirées but in her urgency she had not recognized him. In her disappointment, she leaned against the gold embossed papered wall for support. She had been too late with her news. They had heard already and a rescue party had been formed and despatched. Once again she could do nothing constructive but must remain passively in the Legation Quarter whilst others gave assistance.

  ‘Are you all right, Miss Harland?’ George Morrison asked, a small frown of worry puckering his brow. ‘Perhaps you would like a glass of lemonade?’

  Olivia shook her head, a tendril of dark hair springing loose and curling provocatively at the side of her face.

  ‘No thank you, Doctor Morrison. It was just that I had hoped to be able to help. So many people are suffering and it seems that there is nothing that I can do. I had hoped that my coming here tonight would have helped the Belgians in Ch’anghsintien. It had not occurred to me that you would already have had the news.’

  ‘I am a journalist,’ George Morrison said gently. ‘ It is my job to know what is happening.’

  Olivia managed a small smile. ‘Yes. And I am glad that you received the news so quickly. Will the Chamots be able to save the people who are trapped?’

  ‘If they can reach them,’ George Morrison replied, his frown returning. ‘The countryside is in turmoil.’

  Despite the airless heat, Olivia shuddered. If Lewis had heard news of the Belgians trapped at Ch’anghsintien he would have been one of the first to ride out to their aid. Had he ridden with the Chamots? She ran the tip of her tongue nervously along her lower lip, longing to ask and yet afraid that if she should mention his name, her voice would betray emotions that no one, least of all the perceptive Dr Morrison, must guess.

  ‘How many people rode with Monsieur Chamot?’ she asked, her heart beating fast and light.

  ‘His wife, four Frenchmen, and a young Australian.’

  She tried to speak but could not. He hadn’t been with them. She still did not know where he was, or if he was safe. At last she managed to say, her voice trembling slightly, ‘Madam Chamot must be an extremely courageous lady.’

  ‘She is,’ George Morrison replied, eyeing her curiously. Despite her attempts at composure, she was still deeply distressed and he had a shrewd idea that her concern was not entirely for the stranded Belgians. ‘ Madam Chamot is young and American, and as gallant as Doctor Sinclair assures me that you yourself are.’

  He saw the sudden rush of colour to her cheeks and was just congratulating himself on having once again made a correct deduction when an upper bedroom door slammed and Lewis strode swiftly to the head of the stairs.

  ‘I’ve taken your revolver, Morrison, as well as my rifle, and…’ He halted in mid-sentence, staring down at Olivia in stunned disbelief. The midnight-blue silk of her evening gown was cut low, revealing high, creamy breasts. Her hair shimmered, soft and dark and her eyes stared up at him, wide and incredulous. His hand tightened on the banister and he could hear his breath coming in harsh rasps.

  ‘What the devil are you doing here?’ he asked, shock and fear for her safety making his voice curt. ‘The streets are unsafe. There could be an attack at any moment!’

  The blood drummed in her ears. ‘ I was at the French Legation. The Minister received news of the attack at Fengtai and told us that some of the engineers and their families were trapped at Ch’anghsintien and I came to tell Monsieur Chamot. I thought that he would organize a rescue party and that I…’

  ‘He has done so already,’ Lewis said, buckling his holster and running lightly down the remaining stairs.

  ‘I wanted to ride with him,’ Olivia finished, a dangerous spark in the depths of her blue eyes.

  Dr Morrison folded his arms, leaned against the wall and watched with interest as Lewis sucked in his breath and said vehemently, ‘Are you actively trying to get your
self killed? Have you any idea of the situation that now exists in the countryside?’ He slung his rifle over his shoulder and headed for the door. ‘ Morrison, see to it that Miss Harland reaches home safely.’

  ‘No!’ The passion in her voice shocked even herself. It rooted Lewis and his companion to the spot. ‘ I will not be left behind! Madame Chamot has ridden to Ch’anghsintien with her husband and I am going to ride to Ch’anghsintien!’

  His brow quirked upwards but there was no amusement in the depths of his night-black eyes. ‘In that?’ he asked, surveying the midnight blue silk in a way that flooded her body with heat.

  ‘Yes.’ Swiftly she crossed the Chinese tiled hall, standing between him and the open doorway. ‘That is where you are going now, isn’t it? You are going to try and catch up with the Chamots.’

  His silence was her answer. She lifted her head high and this time there was no tremble of emotion in her voice, no trace of uncertainty. ‘Then I either go with you, or I ride there alone.’

  Something hot flickered at the back of his eyes and George Morrison wondered if it was merely admiration or more. Much more. The silence stretched out between them, so charged with emotion that George Morrison felt like an interloper. Then, swinging his rifle up on to his shoulder in a quick, decisive movement, Lewis said, ‘The ponies are already saddled. There are no other clothes for you to change into. You will have to manage as best you can.’

  Her smile was so sudden, so dazzling, that George Morrison caught his breath audibly.

  ‘Of course,’ she said, and without a second’s hesitation bent down and lifted the hem of her gown, ripping wide the yards of shimmering silk. George Morrison had an amazing glimpse of remarkably narrow ankles and devastatingly well-shaped white-stockinged legs and then she was running out into the night in Lewis’s wake. He saw Lewis help her up into the saddle, saw them both freeze momentarily at the brief physical contact, saw the two Chinese who were to accompany them pick up the leading reins of the spare ponies, and then Lewis raised his hand high in farewell, and they were gone.